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My research has taken two routes. The
first is the impact that goals have on the way consumers interpret
marketing communication. The second route is the impact that goals have
on how consumers use products, both market and non-market products. For
more information about my research please see my Publications.
My dissertation investigated the impact
that consumers’ goals and communication strategy have on the formation of
an image for a brand. This information can be used to develop a firm’s
long-term product introduction strategy. We demonstrated that products
are linked together by their ability to fulfill a set of goals common to
the core product category. This same concept must be incorporated into
the communication strategy for brand extensions. Along with this
research, I am continuing to investigate the impact that goals have on how
communication strategies can be used to more effectively communicate with
consumers. This includes the impact that consumer goals have on how
product instructions, disclosures, warnings, and other types of
communications are used by consumers.
In addition, I have investigated
the influence of consumer goals and risk perceptions on how consumers mitigate the risks associated with natural disasters such as wildfires. My colleagues and I have received over $750,000 as funding
for this research through the U.S. Forest Service and National Fire Plan Funds.The information from this set of research has been used
to develop strategies for homeowners living in the wildland urban interface and policy makers to mitigate this risk.
I recently expanded my research in consumer goals to look at the
role that Terror Management has on how consumers use various types of
marketing communication such as warnings, public service announcements, and other types of disclosures to affect their choice to mitigate risks. This research hypothesizes that
because consumers do not feel comfortable facing death-related images and
information, they are not likely to attend to health-related messages.
Instead, we hypothesize that other types of messages such as focusing
social risk and loss of social relationship messages are more likely to be effective at encouraging consumers to mitigate their risks. We are currently looking at smokers, social smokers, as well as young adults at risk of starting to smoke. This ongoing research will also be linked with
consumers’ goals to investigate the possible impact of these two on how
consumers interpret and heed marketing communications. An extension of this research is the investigation of how magical beliefs affect consumers' healthy lifestyle behaviors.
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